As he prepares to officially start training camp in Madrid, Sergio Martinez is fully focused on his June 7 fight against Miguel Cotto.

The WBC middleweight champion won’t even talk about how many times he intends to fight after facing Cotto at Madison Square Garden. But if the Argentine southpaw’s injury-ravaged body holds up and he conquers Cotto in their HBO Pay-Per-View main event, don’t count on the 39-year-old Martinez embracing a showdown with Gennady Golovkin in his following fight.

Some boxing fans and media believe the knockout artist from Kazakhstan has supplanted Martinez (51-2-2, 28 KOs) as boxing’s best middleweight. The valid debate aside, boxing Golovkin obviously represents a serious risk for Martinez and he wants to make sure the highly anticipated fight is worthwhile financially if he were to sign up for that type of danger.

“Golovkin still has to catch up territory-wise,” Martinez said during the recently completed press tour for the Martinez-Cotto fight. “We earned the spot. Obviously, Golovkin is working his way there, but he still has to work a little more to get to our level. It looks like he’s going to get there, but he’s not there yet.”

Martinez is ranked No. 9 on BoxingScene.com’s pound-for-pound list. He has not fought since he overcame an eighth-round knockdown during his closer-than-expected unanimous-decision victory over England’s Martin Murray (26-1-1, 11 KOs) on April 27 in Buenos Aires.

The 31-year-old Golovkin (29-0, 26 KOs) is one the sport’s most active world champions, but he has taken an indefinite break from boxing to mourn the recent death of his father. Golovkin was supposed to defend his WBA middleweight title against Ireland’s Andy Lee (31-2, 22 KOs) on April 26 in The Theater at Madison Square Garden. It is not known when he’ll return to the ring or if the Lee fight, which would’ve been broadcast by HBO, will be rescheduled.

Keith Idec covers boxing for The Record and Herald News, of Woodland Park, N.J., and BoxingScene.com. He can be reached on Twitter @Idecboxing.

Golovkin, as a fighter, is doing what he needs to do, KO people and create some buzz.
His resume is what it is; nothing special, but he's KO'ed almost everybody he's faced.
Let's be realistic regarding Sergio though;
At 37 years of age he fought Chavez jr , sustained a knee injury and ha...

[QUOTE=HeroBando]GBP guys don't fight on HBO. How did you fail to notice?[/QUOTE]
I honestly doubt this now... I think al haymons fighters don't fight on HBO Idk if Lara is signed to haymon but I do think the drift between odl and dick is real... We'll be seeing gbp fighters on HBO sooner or l...

[QUOTE=jbpanama]The Big Joke, is # 1, who hasen't takin a True Challenge in 10+ Years...[/QUOTE]
The real joke is the short midget that got knocked out in the 6th round against a smaller fighter (when he was rated #2 pound for pound). Now he is not rated no higher than 11 or 12!
His dumb ...

Is that why he is fighting Cotto? How does Cotto prepare you for GGG? Murray is a game fighter so I give Sergio credit for pulling out the win even though it was a close fight. If his legs are back he can be tough prey for Gennady but anyone saying GGG hasn't shown the potential to be p4p worthy ...